THE COMMENTATORIAL SPIRIT. 293 



joined themselves at once to the string of slaves 

 who were dragging the car of Aristotle and Plotinus. 

 Nor, perhaps, on a little further reflection, shall we 

 be surprized at this want of vigour and productive 

 power, in this period of apparent national youth. 

 The Arabians had not been duly prepared rightly 

 to enjoy and use the treasures of which they 

 became possessed. They had, like most uncivilized 

 nations, been passionately fond of their indigenous 

 poetry ; their imagination had been awakened, but 

 their rational powers and speculative tendencies 

 were still torpid. They received the Greek philo- 

 sophy without having passed through those grada- 

 tions of ardent curiosity and keen research, of ob- 

 scurity brightening into clearness, of doubt succeeded 

 by the joy of discovery, by which the Greek mind 

 had been enlarged and exercised. Nor had the 

 Arabians ever enjoyed, as the Greeks had, the indi- 

 vidual consciousness, the independent volition, the 

 intellectual freedom, arising from the freedom of 

 political institutions. They had not felt the con- 

 tagious mental activity of a small city ; the elation 

 arising from the general sympathy in speculative 

 pursuits diffused through an intelligent and acute 

 audience; in short, they had not had a national 

 education such as fitted the Greeks to be disciples 

 of Plato and Hipparchus. Hence, their new literary 

 wealth rather encumbered and enslaved, than en- 

 riched and strengthened them: in their want of 

 taste for intellectual freedom, they were glad to 



